Fighting my Sin of Least Resistance

For Those Searching for Supernatural Self-Control

I had just sworn—much to my wife’s surprise. What’s worse was I didn’t know why.

Growing up in South London, swearing was regular feature of my life until I’d been convinced and convicted that my careless tongue was to come under God’s reign and rule just like the rest of me. It had been years though, I had slipped up here and there, but always in the most difficult of situations.

This wasn’t one of them.

It was the middle of the day and we were having a regular conversation and suddenly, I’d sworn.

What had changed? I’d just started taking steroids.

I was at the start of a year stuck in bed, and little did I know that along with struggling to walk, or interact with people, or do any kind of meaningful tasks, I would also have to battle my old sin of least resistance all over again as the steroids stripped away my self-control.

Truth be told, there were times we laughed at the vulgar additions to my sentences, but more often than not, it was just upsetting.

I knew I ought not to, and yet, I continued in my sin.

The year dragged on as more medicine was added to an already bitter cocktail, and I had to reckon with the fact that this sin would not go away on its own. I had to come before God and trust him again that he was stronger than my sin, mightier than the medicine, and ever able to fill me with the fruit of the Spirit.

“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

Galatians 5:22-23 ESV

As I’ve spoken with other people since then, It’s struck me how common it is to have a particular proclivity for a certain sin. Whatever the sin happens to be, it often ushers a sense of hopelessness into our lives. You may recognise it yourself, the thought that, “this will never go away, it will never leave me!” I call these our “sins of least resistance,” the ones that we fall into without thinking, whether due to habit, repetition, or a sense that they’re somehow less serious than other sins.

It is true, of course, that sin will always be among us until Jesus returns, because the same weakness that was in our first father still besets us today, however, the Father—the one who will never fail—empowers us by the Spirit within us, and guides us in and through the church.

Take a look at the fruits of the Spirit again:

• Love

• Joy

• Peace

• Patience

• Kindness

• Goodness

• Faithfulness

• Gentleness

• Self-control

We might be tempted to read that list and mistakenly treat it as though the first eight pertain to community, and the ninth is to be wrestled with in secret.

We read the word “self” and it constrains our vision of what “control” looks like, and so we keep it to ourselves. That, in turn, leads to the second issue; that we tend to separate the fruits of the Spirit out as if they’re to be experienced independently of one another.

There’s an old foraging term I learned a while back, “what grows together, goes together” and the same is true here. We ought to prepare the fruit of self-control in a mixing bowl that also contains the other fruits. These fruits are not simply evidences of spiritual maturity, but one of the primary ways that the Spirit provides help in times of need.

When I was at the height of my struggle, my wife and the people that lived with us showed me immense kindness, they were gentle with me when I sinned, patient in love, they prayed for me faithfully, because they trusted in the Lord to bring peace to our home and to my mind.

If you’re struggling with sin that you feel cannot be excoriated, you have two options:

1. Struggle alone, without the Spirit’s help, and out of the sight of others, or,

2. Bring it into the light, trust God to change you above and beyond your own weak strength, and allow others to bear fruit that will nourish your soul too.

I could not have borne the weight of my sin of least resistance without the strength given to me by the Spirit, and by the body of Christ.

Grace and Peace,

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